Search for chopper's missing pilot continues

JAKARTA (JP): Search and rescue workers continued scouring the Tomini Bay in Central Sulawesi yesterday for the body of the pilot of PT Gatari's helicopter which crashed into the sea on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the bodies of three crew members were flown to Jakarta to be handed over to their relatives.

The Bell 212 helicopter with five crew members on board crashed into the sea in Donggala on its way from the East Kalimantan town of Balikpapan to Gorontalo in Central Sulawesi.

The only survivor of the accident, co-pilot John Marjono, was present for a ceremony at Palu's Mutiara airport in which governor Abdul Azis Lamadjido formally handed over the remains of the victims to Gatari's operational director Iwan Paul.

The bodies of load master Andi Basri, 35, mechanic Soemarno, 44, and Philippine mechanic Roger Victoria, 35, were pulled from the wrecked helicopter, which was lying upside down on a coral reef on Saturday.

The wreck with pilot Abdul Rahman Saleh's body still tied up in the cockpit, however, disappeared from view when SAR workers returned only hours later. High waves were believed to have hurled it to the bottom of the sea.

Antara reported yesterday that the navy has called in its divers from Manado, North Sulawesi, to locate the wreckage.

Marjono, who survived by holding onto a flotation device, said he saw the pilot's body tied to his seat but he could not help because he was weak from swallowing too much fuel-polluted sea water.

"I managed to pull Andi Basri out alive but he was too weak to cling to me and drowned before the passing fishermen came to the rescue," he recounted.

He said the crash occurred following a failure in the transmission system, which moves the rotors, and not because of engine trouble as was earlier suggested.

A doctor from PT Gatari said the cause of the fatalities was the impact of the chopper's fall coupled with inhaling the fuel- contaminated sea water.

"Inhaling too much of the contaminated water made them faint. If they had not been knocked unconscious, they might have survived like John Marjono," he said.

The helicopter dropped to the sea from a height of 3,000 feet, turning upside down after its float automatically activated after touching water. (pan)